‘Love, Loss and What I Wore’ a comedy of women’s clothing
Clothes make the man.
They can define a woman.
Nora and Delia Ephron’s “Love, Loss and What I Wore” threads memory to merino in a play about the female wardrobe as a time capsule documenting a woman’s life. Aux Dog Theatre will perform the piece for the third time beginning on Friday, Dec. 1.
Nora Ephron, the Academy Award-nominated screenwriter of “When Harry Met Sally,” “Sleepless in Seattle” and “You’ve Got Mail,” penned the play with her sister Delia based on the 1995 book by Ilene
Beckerman.
“It is a hoot,” Aux Dog producing artistic director Vicki Liberatori said. “We’re bringing it back by popular demand.
“It’s a series of very funny or poignant monologues and ensemble pieces about women’s relationships to their clothing at big moments in their lives,” she added.
Those items of clothing include everything from bras to boots to bathrobes.
“Clothes are not just trivial,” Liberatori added. “They are markers in one’s life.”
Preserving the tangible signs of a lifetime of emotional attachments may be the secret purpose of closets. From Madonna’s breast cones to those puzzling sleeveless turtlenecks of the 1970s to today’s take-charge boots, what women wear has a great deal to do with what they want, how they think of themselves and how others see them.
A character called Gingy acts as the narrator. Another character plays a vixen, a third is a vulnerable Chicago gang member and a fourth portrays a brave cancer patient in this scrapbook of stories. Factor in interfering mothers and disappearing men with odes to black clothing, cowboy boots and outfits that make mothers cringe.
Purses — with their lipstick smudges, crumbling breath mints and spilled perfume — were Nora Ephron’s least favorite accessory.
“Your purse really becomes you,” Liberatori said.